Who’s Really The Fascist?
- This topic has 19 replies, 13 voices, and was last updated 8 years, 4 months ago by
.
-
Posts
-
John Vachon Paramount Theater and dairy truck, 44th Street, NYC 1943 Like most of you, I too see an increase in the use of the term ‘fascism’ in the m
[See the full post at: Who’s Really The Fascist?]One of the ways in which analysts consistently fail to understand China is the insidious human wish to be able to ascribe a functional unity to the “government” – when none exists.
Multiple internal powers in China work against each other – through what is presented to the world as the central government. Precisely the same is true in “Western” governments, at all levels including international. The easiest way to truly see this is to look not from the top down, but from the corporations up.
The interests of Exxon are not the same as those of Monsanto. Or those of Boeing. Or the US Air Force. Or the Mafia. Or Goldman-Sachs. Or the CIA. Lockheed. Sony. ConAgra. Harvard. The US Navy. ATT&T. Toyota.
All-American; all of those are very serious powers indeed; with international power bases- which pursue to the uttermost their own agendas, entirely out of the public view. They will, can, and do cut each other’s throats whenever possible.
Who writes our legislation these days? Nearly without exception; draft legislation is written for corporate purposes, by corporate authors- and “trickled up” with minimal efforts to disguise it.
If you work in DC – you know this. The “good guys” in our own government now spend most of their efforts attempting to mitigate the relentless attacks. Stop them, expose them? Not an option. They will kill you. (if I have an accident in the next few weeks, you’ll know why.)
Mussolini said people were at their best when: “War alone brings up to their highest tension all human energies and imposes the stamp of nobility upon the peoples who have the courage to make it”. The first neocon? Terrorism is crime, political or otherwise. With the end of the Cold War, American citizens, particularly boomers and their parents were taken off the Cold War fear of nuclear attack which began post WW-II. The end of history was a threat to the military-industrial-congessional-financial complex gravy train, so new enemies were required to keep us at our best. The war on terror, like that on drugs and poverty keeps us on edge and needing to be alert and armed. In the Wild West, you checked your guns at the door. Now, always be ready to hit the deck, shelter in place. In a world becoming short on resources, cooperation is effective for perpetuation of communities, but conflict makes some individuals rich. A moral rather than an economic problem.
Best yet, Ilargi!
” They will, can, and do cut each other’s throats whenever possible.” Watching the sharks slice each other to shreds will be great circus for knowing survivors on the outside.
“A moral rather than an economic problem. ” In the end, only ethics can give our lives meaning.
Ilargi:
And I write this to indicate that fascism may well already be amongst us, and it would be a good idea if we learned to recognize it. To suggest that perhaps, if we’re honest, Hillary is closer to Mussolini than Trump is to Hitler.Yep; we have identified the enemy and it is us; the gullible, uneducated, belief ridden, and critical thinking disabled.
Nice one Ilargi…V. Arnold – U.S. citizens are indeed uneducated re their government. They watch the spin doctors on CNN and actually believe them. It’s not that the media outright lie in most cases. They spin, provide SOME facts, but it’s what they leave out, by omission, that takes its toll. Most people do not have the time (as we have) to question everything; in fact, they don’t even know they have to. I used to trust my government. I didn’t think they’d ever try to knowingly screw us over. But how wrong I was.
Of course, once you do start reading, once something, anything, piques your interest, you read something you really disagree with, you do start reading, and then all of a sudden you start reading something else, and if you continue, it eventually becomes clear. But that takes time and if you’ve got children and a busy life, a job, a long commute, it’s very hard to keep up.
I’m not making excuses for them, just to say that you don’t know what you don’t know. Many people following economics (which leads into politics, foreign policy, etc.) started because they were either being screwed or they wanted to know how to make more (follow the money). Most people don’t have two dimes to rub together. When a lot of people lost their homes (bit off more than they could chew), a few people suddenly got smart and started asking questions.
For those who don’t know what’s happening, it will take a big crisis to wake them up. They’re not stupid; they’ll listen when someone can spell it out in simple, honest terms (something we don’t get from economists, the media, etc.)
Many who do know what’s happening simply follow in order to make more money. They really could care less who is getting screwed; they just want more.
“Hillary is closer to Mussolini than Trump is to Hitler.” Yes, unfortunately I think by a long shot.
This is really a very good article, “Feel the Hate”. The fakers are laid bare.
“Obama’s time in the White House office has been a big wet kiss to the super-rich and powerful (whose wealth has concentrated yet further under his presidency) combined with a raised middle finger pointed in the direction of the party’s progressives and the nation’s working class majority. As the investigative researcher Eric Zuesse noted last summer, “Under Presidents G.W. Bush and Barack Obama, economic inequality in America has been more extreme, for more years, than under any Presidents in all of the previous U.S. history. But, at least, Bush didn’t pretend to care about it. Obama does. He pretended to a concern for justice which he never really had; he was always merely faking liberalism.”
Faking liberalism while serving the wealthy few was also a defining aspect of Bill and Hillary’s first two terms as co-presidents. During their first eight years atop the executive branch, the Clintons advanced the neoliberal agenda beneath faux-progressive cover in ways that no Republican president could have pulled off. […]
Hillary can pretend to be against the TPP for vote-getting (and progressive Democrat-pleasing) purposes in the primary season. Top corporate lobbyists know that this is just populism-manipulating politics as usual and that she can be counted on to advance the “free trade” agenda once she gets back into the White House. As Secretary of State (2009-2013), Hillary repeatedly voiced strong support of the TPP. In Australia in November of 2012, she said that “TPP sets the gold standard in trade agreements for open free, transparent, [and]fair trade…” She has already suggested that she will put the arch-neoliberal Goldman Sachs Democrat Bill Clinton in charge of White House economic policy once she returns.”
So Hillary is going to put Bill in charge of economic policy? Look out! I wonder what he’ll repeal this time around. Read this article. It’ll bring everything back into clear focus.
Wiki “Oligarchy” page: “Oligarchy (from Greek…), meaning “few”, and ἄρχω (arkho), meaning “to rule or to command”) is a form of power structure in which power effectively rests with a small number of people.
“Some contemporary authors have characterized current conditions in the United States as oligarchic in nature. Simon Johnson wrote that “the reemergence of an American financial oligarchy is quite recent,” a structure which he delineated as being the “most advanced” in the world. Jeffrey A. Winters wrote that “oligarchy and democracy operate within a single system, and American politics is a daily display of their interplay.” […]
In 1998, Bob Herbert of the The New York Times referred to modern American plutocrats as “The Donor Class” (list of top donors) and defined the class, for the first time, as “a tiny group – just one-quarter of 1 percent of the population – and it is not representative of the rest of the nation. But its money buys plenty of access.”
French economist Thomas Piketty states in his 2013 book, Capital in the Twenty-First Century, that “the risk of a drift towards oligarchy is real and gives little reason for optimism about where the United States is headed.”
A study conducted by political scientists Martin Gilens of Princeton University, and Benjamin Page of Northwestern University, was released in April 2014, which stated that their “analyses suggest that majorities of the American public actually have little influence over the policies our government adopts.” The study analyzed nearly 1,800 policies enacted by the US government between 1981 and 2002, and compared them to the expressed preferences of the American public as opposed to wealthy Americans and large special interest groups. It found that wealthy individuals and organizations representing business interests have substantial political influence, while average citizens and mass-based interest groups have little to none. […]
Gilens says that average citizens only get what they want if wealthy Americans and business-oriented interest groups also want it; that is, economic elites and their interest groups are influential, and that when a policy favored by the majority of the American public is implemented, it is usually because the economic elites did not oppose it. […]
In a 2015 interview, former President Jimmy Carter stated that the United States is now “an oligarchy with unlimited political bribery,” due to the Citizens United ruling, which effectively removed limits on donations to political candidates.”
Here are a couple of alternative views:
An essay looking at Vladimir Putin, the foremost leader on the world stage right now, and saying he has a “third way”. There is a lot of reference and struggling to explain, but basically it says he is a benevolent-despot, a philosopher-king, a godly-champion.
https://journal-neo.org/2016/06/14/what-if-vladimir-putin-does-know-a-third-way-for-society/
Not-dead-yet Fidel Castro talks about the war of ideas, truth vs deception, and the very real threat of “practical” nuclear war from the neocon ideologues, fronted by Hillary Clinton.All Your email Are Belong To Us, Love, Vlad.
The reports indicated that the decision as to whether to reveal the intercepts would be made by Russian Federation President Vladimir Putin, and it was possible that the release would, if made, be through a third party, such as Wikileaks.
https://oilprice.com/Latest-Energy-News/World-News/Russia-Is-Reportedly-Set-To-Release-Intercepted-Messages-From-Clintons-Private.htmlLike u have stated all western political leaders r a kin to fascism, Lo Stato Corporato which is the Title to Mussolini’s book is the manual to modern fascism this inspired Hitler to write Mein Keimp. If one reads Mussolini’s book which in translation the title reads The Corporate State. Jimmy Carter was the last president to try to counter this rising phenomena in USA. It went on turbo charge with the likes of Thatcher and Reagan. Like u have noted every facet of western society is coporatised . Health care education all tiers primary ,secondary and tertiary levels of education. The selling off of state assets to private hands. Hence we r living Mussolinis dream and From Reagan to our present politicians all have blood on their hands and Hillary(Hitlary) as I like to call her ( “We Came We Saw He Died )” and followed by that maniacal laugh . That proves to me she is dangerous. Hence when looking at what fascism is well fellow westerners we r living it as we speak. The trade deals that r being proposed will make it full spectrum minus the few. Hence to end this argument I refer to the washington consensus = The third Reich of Nazi Germany. Invasion of Grenada. The Haitian incident , Iran -Contra Affair, The invasion and occupation of Iraq, The invasion and Occupation of Afghanistan. The arming and funding proxy war in Syria creating a foreign Takfiri army to do washington bidding. The Bombing and ruins of Libya which under Qhadaffi had the best standard of living , free housing ,healthcare and education and look at it now just because he would not follow the Washington consensus. Brazil ,Argentina ,Ecuador, and Bolivia r all recent ramblings created by the cabalist (washington consensus)
You are making an understandable mistake, since most people don’t really know what is fascism. I started to study fascism four years ago, when I realised that, given the resource issues in our planet, history suggests that the rise of a fascist or fascist-like government in some major Western country or countries was very likely.
I’ll explain: when a society finds that resources are more limited than they’re used to, they mainly have two options: fragmenting or a more authoritarian government. In theory, an enlightened society could realise that they’ll all have to make do with less, and maintain people’s freedoms while scaling down. In practice, this rarely happens, because as long as some people refuse to believe that it’s necessary to reduce their use of resources, there will be problems. The only way around this is a more authoritarian government, where people have to put up with whatever allocation of resources the government chooses, or else. Alternatively, the country may fragment into smaller pieces, and each fragment can deal with the issues separately. This has the advantage of reducing bureaucratic overheads, which in some cases does help.
A fascist government is nothing but a right-wing authoritarian government. Where people get confused is in thinking they are “extreme right”. In actual fact, they usually are just right of centre in economic issues, but willing to apply radical measures with a strong hand if it’s deemed appropriate. Where they are extreme right is on social issues, but that’s mainly because it’s expedient for the purpose of brainwashing people into conformity and obedience. It’s easier to make people to conform when minorities are taken out of the way, if not literally (like Hitler) at least by reducing their status to the point where they’re a lot less visible.
When you understand this, it’s clear that Clinton is not fascist and Trump is. Trump has already demonstrated a willingness to ignore the constitution if it was expedient. He’s said that he expects the situation of his trial on Trump University to change if he becomes elected president, which is to say, the first thing he plans to do when he gets in office is to destroy the independence of judges. He’s also said he’d have a go at freedom of speech, and make it much easier for people to stop journalists from saying things he doesn’t like. And religious discrimination is likely to become policy.
Say what you like about Clinton’s policies, but at least it doesn’t look like she will stop at nothing to force people to put up with them. Trump, on the other hand, promises to be tough and do exactly that.
It’s true that Trump hasn’t started WWIII or killed vast amounts of people. But he hasn’t really had the chance. Hitler hadn’t started WWII or killed masses of Jews when he was running for election. By the time it was obvious what kind of danger he was, it was too late for anyone to try to change it, because he had too strong a hold on power.
Doly – interesting points. Thanks for posting. I agree with many of your points, but disagree with you on Clinton. She is a warmonger, and she will put all of us in harm’s way with Russia. Bank on it.
“It’s easier to make people to conform when minorities are taken out of the way, if not literally (like Hitler) at least by reducing their status to the point where they’re a lot less visible.”
Trump has no problem (and neither do the U.S. citizens) with the legal immigrants. It’s the illegals they have a problem with. The U.S. citizens end up paying for these illegals (health, education, housing). They end up lowering the citizens’ wages (because there are so many of them) and housing prices and rental rates rise (because there are more people looking for accommodation). This is all lose-lose for the U.S. citizens, not win-win.
“…the first thing he plans to do when he gets in office is to destroy the independence of judges. ”
Trump has spoken out against the judge presiding over the Trump University case. I agree with him. The judge, who belongs to La Raza (which promotes helping Latino illegals), has a clear conflict of interest and should have excused himself from the case (as many judges have done in the past), especially since one of Trump’s policies is to stop the flow of illegals across the Mexican border. There is a clear conflict here, and no one can deny that.
“…stop journalists from saying things he doesn’t like.” I don’t think Trump has said that. I think he’s referring to the fact that almost all of our media (yes, even CNN) is owned by approximately 6 major corporations. There is a monopoly on information. It’s no wonder the average American citizen is ill-informed. They’re not getting the other side on serious issues. So much information is purposely left out. We need to break up the media monopolies (just as with the major banking corporations) so that we can fair and honest reporting. Where are the investigative journalists? They’re still around, but they are silenced by the bought-and-paid-for monopolies.
“…and religious discrimination is likely to become policy.” Likely? Why? I don’t think anyone, including Trump, is advocating that. People can practice whatever religion they choose, so long as they don’t cause harm to anyone in so doing.
For me, fascism is the persecution and denial of reason.
I’m only seeing that from one candidate, Hillary Clinton.
skipbreakfast
Yep. Not to mention Clinton is a rabid Russophobe, Putin hater, and proven warhawk.
WWIII anyone?>>The interests of Exxon are not the same as those of Monsanto. Or those of Boeing. Or the US Air Force. Or the Mafia. Or Goldman-Sachs. Or the CIA. Lockheed. Sony. ConAgra. Harvard. The US Navy. ATT&T. Toyota.<<
Hi Greenpa, but the interests of the Debt-Money Monopolists are the interests of the Debt-Money Monopolists and, being the financiers and top investors in each of those mega-corporations, there is more unity in direction than you might think at present. As an example, watch “Who Killed the Electric Car?”
After watching the documentary, the answer is not clear. Why did GM go against their own economic interests in the end? Cui bono? Let me extrapolate some succinct wisdom and insight shared by Napoleon one day, a long time ago…“When a government is dependent upon bankers for money, they and not the leaders of the government control the situation, since the hand that gives is above the hand that takes. Money has no motherland; financiers are without patriotism and without decency; their sole object is gain.”
― Napoléon BonaparteLet’s update it…
“When a corporation is dependent upon bankers for money, they and not the leaders of the corporation control the situation, since the hand that gives is above the hand that takes. Money has no motherland; financiers are without patriotism and without decency; their sole object is gain.”
― Napoléon BonaparteThis is why Krugman was instructed to “never touch the money system” and his personal economic future was threatened if he did so… touch anything, BUT THE MONEY SYSTEM.
Krugman to Lietaer: “Never touch the money system!”
“You are killing yourself academically if you touch the money system.”
~Paul KrugmanThe “one ring to control them all” is the the DEBT-MONEY SYSTEM. The CONTROLLERS of that system are the true sovereigns, BY DEFINITION. Nicole explains deflation BY DEFINITION and she’s exactly right. I’m calling out SOCIETAL POWER BY DEFINITION.
The Money Power is supreme over everything else, BY DEFINITION. If anything else was supreme to the current Money Power, THEIR FIRST ACT WOULD BE TO SECURE THE MONEY POWER FOR THEMSELVES! Duh, right? Common sense is entirely uncommon in the mind of those programmed by the debt-money financed media-matrix.
Hi Ilargi, corporations are legal fictions. Legal fictions don’t do anything, PEOPLE DO IT. Why do people do things in a corporation? TO EARN MONEY. WHOSE MONEY? THE DEBT-MONEY MONOPOLIST’S MONEY. These people managing these corporation support the agenda of the OWNER/CONTROLLERS of the company – the majority OWNERS. WHO will own a majority of the mega-corporations if not the Debt-Money Monopolists who, even according to Steve Keen’s own model, MAKES MORE MONEY THAN EVERY PRODUCTIVE HUMAN BEING IN SOCIETY simply by controlling the mechanism of debt-based monetary expansion?
Expanding on Napoleon’s quote, which ought to be a famous quote…
“When a government (or corporation) is dependent upon bankers for money, they and not the leaders of the government (or the corporation) control the situation, since the hand that gives is above the hand that takes. Money has no motherland; financiers are without patriotism and without decency; their sole object is gain.”
― Napoléon BonaparteRead the comments to see Mr. Keen’s attempt to “never touch the money system” as the complete fraud that is debt-based money was revealed to him here:
The Principal And Interest On Debt Myth
https://www.forbes.com/sites/stevekeen/2015/03/30/the-principal-and-interest-on-debt-myth-2/#3fe8f0ee6823Well, I shouldn’t say “revealed.” Based on his response, I think he already knew all about it, but was determined to keep the little secret that impoverishes billions and kills 10s of millions of people per year…
The Debt-Money Monopolists define and control “the one ring to control them all” – the debt-money system.
Everyone under their debt-money system is living in what is best described as a Debt-Money Monopolist Mega-Corporacratic Fascist Empire.
It is critical not to lump in powerless corporations (like your local (NOT NATIONAL!) furniture store) with, say, JP Morgan Chase and Goldman Sachs. The Debt-Money Monopolists are extraordinary in their ability to mind control ordinary people into over generalizations.
It isn’t the Rothschild’s, it is “all Jews.” It isn’t their robber baron mega-corporations, it is all corporations. It isn’t the Debt-Money Monopolist robber barons, it is “white people.” The way out of their lies and mis/disinformation is to apply intellectual self-defense in our minds and to actually think INDEPENDENT of the DEBT-MONEY MONOPOLIST MATRIX.
If you controlled the world’s money and collected interest on it simply because you issued near unlimited amounts of it out of the aether based someone’s obligation to pay it back with interest, YOU’D CONTROL THE AGENDA OF THE PLANET, TOO.
BTW, every country not under the heal of the Debt-Money Monopolist’s fraudulent debt-money system are “enemies” that are being actively demonized so that their current non-compliant (to the Debt-Money Monopolists) governments can be overthrown, international war crimes be damned, and a debt-money central bank can be set up… just like what was orchestrated in Libya.
Oh, and as an aside, isn’t it interesting that Donald Trump is called “racist” when it was Hillary that unleashed (on the orders of the Debt-Money Monopolists) al Qaeda to commit black genocide of 10s of thousands of economically disadvantaged black Africans?
(Hillary Supported) Libyan rebel ethnic cleansing and lynching of black people
https://humanrightsinvestigations.org/2011/07/07/libya-ethnic-cleansing/Libya : “Rebels” Are Lynching Black Africans
Evidence of war crimes in Libya?
(Hillary’s Supported) al Qaeda Rape Gangs Target Black Women in Refugee Camp
Note that the woman was crying out for UN support. She’s completely oblivious to the fact the UN is run by the very same Debt-Money Monopolist interests that conspired to ruin Libya for ordinary people in order to set up a debt-money central bank and profit off the carnage. Posing as a savior is probably the the greatest “trick” of Satan’s Debt-Money Monopolist minions.
Ilargi: “For Mussolini, fascism was much more about … letting corporations write, define and perhaps even execute a country’s economic policies”
This is a common misconception, but it ignores what the original fascists meant by “corporativism” and “the corporate state”. They were not referring to corporations — i.e. businesses, or legal/commercial entities. They were referring to a conception of the totalitarian state AS a “corporation”, or a whole, undivided body. Think the word “corpse” in the sense of referring to a whole body; corpse, corpora, corporation; unity; a whole body. As Mussolini put it so pithily: “all within the state, nothing outside the state, nothing above the state”. And “the state” referred to everything: the corporations or big businesses, the small businesses (and shopkeepers, and middle class), the workers and trade unionists, the peasants, the military, the teachers, EVERYTHING, EVERYONE. That was the fascist “corporativist” conception, intended to embrace everything, not merely to enthrone one class, or one set of institutions (e.g. corporations), above all else. I’m making no claim about the success of fascism in achieving this; I’m talking about what the fascists meant by the words. Also, this matter of corporativism is not all there was about fascism, just one prominent aspect.
As for the “fascism” of the major candidates and public figures: Trump is a sort of rhetorical fascist, what with his ultranationalism (building walls, excluding “others”, etc.) and rising-from-the-ashes (“make america great again”) imagery. But the actual policies and preferences that he seems to favor do not correspond well to fascism; for example he is much more circumspect about military adventurism and imperial/empire-type policies than his competition, even including Bernie Sanders.
Meanwhile, Hillary is much more of a substantive fascist than a rhetorical one. Rhetorically, she sounds vaguely progressive; but substantively — with respect to actual policy preferences and implementations that could be said to be consistent with fascist inclination — she is a real fascist, or borderline one.
In other words: Trump sometimes SOUNDS like a fascist, but doesn’t really seem to be much of one, while HRC SOUNDS like a progressive, but in actuality is at least quasi-fascist.
- You must be logged in to reply to this topic.
Sorry, the comment form is closed at this time.